College president to lead Standing Rock Sioux (fwd)

[phil cash cash]

	Posted on Fri, Sep. 30, 2005				

College president to lead Standing Rock Sioux
VOWS TO LEARN LAKOTA LANGUAGE

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

  BISMARCK, N.D. - Ron His Horse Is Thunder says he will learn the Lakota
language during his tenure as chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, to
fulfill a promise he made to himself and his constituents during the campaign.

  ''I believe in the language so much that if I don't speak the language in
four years, I will not run again,'' His Horse Is Thunder said Thursday, a day
after he was elected chairman of the tribe.

  His Horse Is Thunder, 47, president of Sitting Bull College in Fort Yates,
out-polled Dave Archambault Sr. 1,236-789 in Wednesday's election. Incumbent
tribal chairman Charles Murphy was not a candidate.

  Avis Little Eagle was elected vice chairman over James T. McLaughlin.
Geraldine Agard defeated incumbent Sharon Two Bears and Adele White for Tribal
Council secretary.

  His Horse Is Thunder has never before served as an elected member of the
Standing Rock tribe, whose reservation straddles the North Dakota-South Dakota
border. It has roughly 18,000 members, and about half of them live on the
reservation, His Horse Is Thunder said.

  Three out of four people living on the reservation are unemployed, he said.

  ''I've got two high priorities - one is economic development,'' His Horse Is
Thunder said. ''When you have 76 percent unemployment, you have to have a plan
to bring jobs to the reservation.

  ''The other is reinforcing and reinstilling pride in our culture and our
language,'' he said.

  His Horse Is Thunder, a descendant of Chief Sitting Bull, said he knows
''about 10 percent'' of his native language.

  He said about a quarter of tribal members are fluent speakers. There are
three language dialects: the Lakota, the Nakota and the Dakota.

  His Horse Is Thunder said he also would call for an amendment in the tribe's
constitution that would allow only those who speak the language of their
ancestors to run for tribal office.

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